


Six Days of the Common Cold

by madeoutoflight



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: (only a little), Cross-Posted on Tumblr, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, I'm Bad At Tagging, M/M, Murder Squash Song, Sick Adam, as of TRK no longer canon compliant, mild swearing, more or less, probably nonsense, so mostly just fluff, sort of set in BLLB, they kiss but there's literally no build-up sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-27
Updated: 2016-04-27
Packaged: 2018-06-04 21:06:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6675469
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madeoutoflight/pseuds/madeoutoflight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adam has a cold. Ronan doesn’t like when Adam lies about feeling fine.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Six Days of the Common Cold

**Author's Note:**

> So I currently have a cold and I literally just finished Blue Lily, Lily Blue and I have to wait another day for my copy of the Raven King, so... this happened. It’s my first time writing for this fandom and I’m really very new to it, so I hope it’s enjoyable at least!

On day one, Adam’s head feels like it’s stuffed with cotton. His deaf ear is suddenly a better listener than his good one; Cabeswater’s whispers are already inside of his head, beneath the cotton, but ordinary sounds are distant, like they’re hitting his ear from the wrong angle. He can’t stop sniffling and slides an extra pack of tissues into his schoolbag. 

•

On day two, he wakes before dawn with a dried, chapped mouth and a familiar dizziness—lack of oxygen. His throat is blocked, both his ears are quiet, and something damp and slimy is gathering beneath his nose. He gropes for the tissues on his plastic nightstand. It’s official now: his annual transition-to-autumn cold has arrived. 

•

On day three, Gansey puts on his overly casual voice to ask him if they should go and buy him cough drops. They don’t have any in the kitchen-bathroom-laundry—he checked—but they can drive down to the store and pick some up. It’s no problem, they were all just going over to Blue’s house anyway. 

“I’m not coughing,” Adam says in his nasal common-cold voice, resting his stuffed head against one of the cool windows of Monmouth Manufacturing. 

“Not yet,” Blue points out. “Hey, I can ask Persephone to make you some tea.” 

Adam politely declines. “I’m fine, really.” 

It’s impossible to look at Ronan’s face after he’s told his lie. 

•

On day four, Adam sneezes so loudly in class that some people begin to laugh. There’s snot all over his no longer perfect notes and his head throbs something awful. The teacher sends him to the school nurse for a painkiller. The nurse tells him to go home and rest. She even insists on walking him to his car and reminding him to drive carefully. 

Adam stops the Hondayota three times on the way to St. Agnes to sneeze responsibly into his rapidly deteriorating supply of tissues. When he arrives, his head is spinning and his ears are clogged up, like he’s just flown a couple of rounds in Gansey’s stupid helicopter. He feels miserable, also like he’s just flown a couple of rounds in Gansey’s stupid helicopter. 

Then he parks his car next to a charcoal BMW. Ronan emerges from the driver’s side almost immediately and saunters up to him as he’s struggling to fit his key into the keyhole. 

“You’re sick,” Ronan says. For once, it doesn’t sound like he means _sick in the head_ , or _fucking awesome_ —it sounds like he means _you have a cold and you’re lying about how it makes you feel_. It sounds like an accusation, directed not at Adam’s lying but at this autumnal world that gives people colds. People Ronan cares about. 

_Are you going to dream me up another cure, like the one for my hands? _Adam wants to ask, but he swallows the words, because Adam Parrish doesn’t ask questions that can be mistaken for requests.__

Of course, since it’s Ronan, he doesn’t need to ask. 

They enter the apartment. Adam drops his keys on his coat by the door. Ronan drops something else on Adam’s coat and then flings himself onto Adam’s desk chair. 

The “something else” is a nondescript white box filled with nondescript strips of brightly striped candies, each round and coin-sized and in different colors. Adam pulls out a strip and studies it almost reverently. 

“No-one paid for those,” Ronan says roughly, because he’s Ronan. “So take them, alright.” 

It’s not a question, or a request. Adam can appreciate that. He takes one. They taste like honey, and their effect is immediate, like a hot shower in the way they open his sinuses. His headache subsides and he smiles. Ronan doesn’t, but the sharp edges of his face soften somehow. 

•

On day five, Gansey and Blue take the Suburban to go hiking with Malory and the Dog, and they refuse to let Adam come because the school nurse sent him home the day before. Ronan tells them in no uncertain terms that he isn’t going to waste his afternoon hanging out with the old guy, and he’d rather keep Sniffles company instead. Adam is too busy discreetly wiping his nose to scowl at Ronan for the nickname. 

They sit in Adam’s room, Ronan in the desk chair and Adam on his bed, and play with the puzzle box. Adam’s deaf ear is still better than his good one, even with Ronan’s dreamed cough drops, but he doesn’t want to repeat Cabeswater’s secrets out loud, not even to the Greywaren. Ronan accepts it without comment and translates strings of swear words into Latin instead. 

It’s such an easy way to spend an afternoon, without having to worry about work since he’s on official sick leave, that Adam’s almost sorry when Blue and Gansey return. It’s nice to listen to them laugh about Malory and the hike and how the Dog refused to relieve himself in the designated spot (and then promptly did so in a spot definitely _not _designated for dogs), but it’s even nicer to make eye contact with Ronan over the strip of striped cough drops and see the hint of a smile on Ronan’s face.__

•

On day six, Adam sneezes into a tissue and realizes the tissue has turned a deep, dark red. He touches a finger to his nose; it comes back red. Blood. 

“Fuck,” Ronan says, dropping the puzzle box on Adam’s desk, “don’t tip your head back, press on—” 

“I know,” Adam interrupts. “This isn’t my first rodeo.” 

They stop and stare at each other. What a strange thing, to have a nosebleed caused by something as innocent as a sneeze. Even in their strange lives, this is a strange thing. Then Adam scrambles to his feet and plunges into the tiny bathroom to grab a roll of toilet paper. Chainsaw crows, like she’s parroting Ronan’s swearing, and sits on Adam’s pillow while he holds a wad of toilet paper to his nose. 

Five minutes at least, he recites to himself, five minutes of pinching his nose closed with his fingers. He’s breathing moisture against his own hand and his head is throbbing again. 

“Damn, Parrish,” Ronan says after a while, “that was a murder sneeze.” 

Adam opens his mouth, starts to stop him, but the glint in Ronan’s blue eyes wins. 

“Squash one, squash two—” 

“Shut up,” Adam says nasally, and then he drops the toilet paper to laugh. It hurts his throat, but what doesn’t right now? At least it doesn’t hurt his heart. 

Ronan picks up the crimson lump of paper and tosses it out of the window. “Your nosebleed is over,” he tells Adam, his voice nearly triumphant, as if that’s somehow his achievement. “Fuck, you look like you’ve been—” 

_Punched_ , is the word he doesn’t say. Adam appreciates that. Ronan gets him a damp cloth to wipe his face clean, wordlessly hands him a striped candy from the dream strip, and grabs the puzzle box from the desk. He studies it in a way that proves he’s avoiding Adam’s eyes, the way he always does after he’s shown some kindness, but Adam knows him too well to be hurt. 

“If I wasn’t worried you’d catch this cold,” he says, forcing Ronan to look up and acknowledge him, “I’d kiss you now.” 

Ronan doesn’t even blink. He locks eyes with Adam and scoffs. “If I haven’t caught your germs yet, Parrish, I’m immune.” 

So Adam gets up and kisses him. It’s simple, really. His lips have to taste a little like blood, because of the nosebleed and because he’s been wearing them down, continually rubbing his tongue over them to keep them from cracking, but Ronan makes no objections. He just shifts the two of them around, so Adam isn’t leaning over him with protesting sinuses anymore, and when he finally opens his mouth, he tastes like striped dream candy. 

•

A week later, Ronan is coughing so loud that teachers and students alike jump back like they’re expecting him to explode. Judging by his face, he just might—until Adam lays a nondescript strip of cough drops into his palm. They share a look, and then a secret smile. 

It turns out Ronan Lynch isn’t immune to Adam Parrish after all. 

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up on [tumblr](http://ravenrcnan.tumblr.com/) or here, I’d love to hear your thoughts!


End file.
